52nd session

Every session has something special about it. Something that makes us go : Arre wah! This session was no exception. With three project speeches, one is bound to have excitement. And when one of those speeches is P-6, there is bound to be entertainment galore. But more of that later...

The SAA for the day MTM Kavita kicked off the meeting sharp at 3.15pm. Though she lacked the stentorian demands of an SAA, her normal sweet voice requesting members to adhere to the no-nos was well-heeded.

The acting President, MTM Panna, related the story of two friends, who, marooned on a desert island, pray for things from God. One person's wishes are immediately gratified while the other remains ungifted. Finally, when the abundant friend is about to sail away in a gifted ship, he finally learns that the poor friend was praying for the other's wishes to be fulfilled. So whose prayer was more powerful? More importantly, friends are usually selfless in their love, and in our friends' circle we must ensure that we always wish each other well. A nice story, VPE, and much shorter than Aji's stories, a fact much appreciated by the timekeeper.

TMOD TM Raja had chosen as his theme FRIENDS. He elaborated on all aspects of friendship in his initial speech as well as in his intros. He also introduced the role-player describing what was their closest friend like and what were the likeable and dislikeable things about him or her. Interestingly, dislikeable things were very mild and uttered with lots of indulgence. That's what true friendship is like. Thanks you TM Raja for this heart-warming theme.

Timekeeper TM Viswanath was introduced and went through his litany effortlessly. We were in no doubts about his timing rules.

Wordmaster was played by MTM Kaviya, who introduced the word HYSTERICAL to the audience. This was a sidewinder because the word has two meanings - distraught as well as amused - and MTM Kaviya innovated on the round-robin by having alternate people make sentences with alternate meanings. This deserved an Arre wah! 

Jokemaster TM Dilip, in the true spirit of the theme, reeled off a series of jokes in the context of friendship. Till now, I do not think a Jokemaster has ever adopted a TMOD theme. This qualifies for another Arre wah! Hats off TM Dilip.

There were three project speeches coming up:  P-2 speech by MTM Swati, with evaluation by TM Kamil; P-3 speech by TM Chaitanya with evaluation by TM Mathen; P-6 speech by TM Ramalingam with evaluation by TM Rajat.

All the three evaluators described the speech criteria with diligence and accuracy.

P-2 speech by MTM Swati, meant to Organize Your Speech, was titled "The Convention Experience", and focused on the visit of MTM Swati to the TMI Convention in USA in August'16. This was a long-cherished wish for her and she ended the speech by exhorting all members to make this trip next year. We will try, MTM Swati, we will try.

P-3 speech by TM Chaitanya, meant to Get to the Point, was titled "My Third Child", and talked about his struggles to become an independent entrepreneur and appealed to the audience to proceed on independent existence with confidence. We were both impressed and motivated, TM Chaitanya.

P-6 speech by TM Ramalingam, meant to showcase Vocal Variety, was titled "Inspired Push". What a different TM Ramalingam this was, my friends, with a laugh-riot of a speech! Not only did he fulfill the project objectives, he entertained the audience so much that we never realised that he had overshot his time limit. A totally different avatar and a definite Arre wah! for this session.

The Topicmaster TM Saleem had also chosen topics that connected to the theme of Friends. It was so nice to see the thread of this theme running through the various role-plays. Next thing,  we will see the wordmaster introducing a word related to the theme (Well, why not?). All the speakers - six of them in fact, causing a mini Arre wah! - spoke comfortably on the topics and it was really difficult to choose the best speaker. Quality is improving constantly, friends.

The speech evaluators gave their feedback on the three project speeches. Evaluation quality is also improving day-by-day, is it not?

Grammarian MTM Shobha gave a series of very specific feedback in a truly humble manner, which made all comments thoroughly acceptable. Very good quality of observations, MTM Shobha. Pointing out good turns of phrase was especially Arre wah!

Harkmaster MTM Alma had a very enjoyable session, and so did the audience, who practically answered all her questions. Good job MTM Alma.

General Evaluator TM Nagesh ran through all the roles meticulously, giving specific suggestions.

Concluding remarks were imparted by MTM Panna as the acting President. 

This was an unusually lively session, in spite of the fact that TM Aji and TM GK were both missing, which means that the club is truly coming of age with many members taking active interest in its success and enjoyment. VPE now has a queue for project speeches!! Kudos to you all.

For once we wrapped up the meeting within the projected time of 5.09 pm. Arre wah!

The day's awards were:

• Best Table topic:  MTM Rita
• Best Evaluator:    TM Rajat
• Best Speaker:       TM Chaitanya

By the way, body-mikes are now a fixture for the club, thanks to TM Chaitaniya, and the final Arre wah! is dedicated to the same.

The meeting adjourned with snacks and tea.

There will be no session on next Saturday, so see you all on 5.11.16. 

Happy Diwali to all of you!

51st session

This session, we celebrated our completion of 50 sessions and a year of operation. It was our first birthday.

What to write about this session....

For those who attended, it would still be so powerfully etched in their minds that a blog reminder is unnecessary. For those who missed it, no amount of description will reproduce the starry-eyed thrill, the warm bonhomie, the gay laughter and the vigorous handshakes that marked the initial interaction session. It felt more like the season's first ball at southern mansion of pre-civil-war America than a serious toastmaster meeting. The walls were decorated with balloons and posters, and a cake nestled coyly at the back. 

With all guests and the keynote speaker seated, the session was kick-started on the dot by TM Afroz, who, like Haley's comet, happened to be whizzing past and had been roped in. Thanks to the body-mikes arranged by TM Chaitanya, everybody had a booming voice today. Nobody could possibly ignore the SAA's stern injunctions.

Our President Aji Baskar, with no premonition of impending doom, started the session by welcoming our chief guest, the keynote speaker, Dr K Rajesh Nayak, Director Training - College of Banking and Financial Studies. Aji then addressed the gathering with a joke-based homily about how a husband, who felt his wife was going deaf, tested her out by speaking to her from various distances. Not finding any replies from her, he finally learnt that she had been speaking to him all the time, which meant he was actually deaf, and not she. Moral of the story - before blaming others, look within.

Hardly had he finished this episode, the lights went out and a cry was heard: "Oh ho! I have been killed". Lights returned to the sight of our beloved President prone on the ground, his head bent at an unnatural angle and blue tongue hanging out. TM Chaitanya, suddenly attired in a jacket and hat, pipe precariously stuck in his lips, bent over the body solicitously, checked for breathing, examined his tummy with a magnifying glass, and declared him definitely dead. All he could tell right then was he had been strangled by a tall man who might be elderly, given the presence of white hairs near the body. As a stand-in detective from Scotland Yard, his manner and demeanor were perfect, and his effort at speaking with clenched teeth (because of the pipe), gave an impression of deep menace. He confided that definitely one of the role-players was the murderer and he would be questioning them in the course of the session and the answers to the same would reveal the culprit to the audience.

I do not think there ever was a TMOD role played like this, with so much preparation of handout material, pre-prepared questions and answers, ensuring co-operation of the role-players and the President and a script for himself that was at once a role as well as a roll (meaning humorous). An excellent idea, energetically undertaken, and professionally delivered. Kudos TM Chaitanya.

The ghost of the President was called forth by a couple of beautiful Tantrics, MTMs Kaviya and Kavita, which allowed our President to clamber up (he getting quite stiff, lying on the cold floor) and take his seat in the front row, beaming happily at his death.

The Timekeeper TM Karthik was introduced, who is a seasoned veteran. He explained all the timings without fumbling with the flags at all. However, he was questioned by the Detective and admitted that the denial of allowing him to carry out his project speech had left a grudge in him against the President. The audience nodded its head thoughtfully.

P-4 evaluation criteria were explained by TM Venkat, in his usual nonchalant style, which highlighted that the speaker was, in this speech, learning How to Say It. However, the interrogation session revealed his frustration at being given very little time to prepare for his debate session. The audience looked at each other and winked.

P-4 speech "Life after IIT" was delivered by TM Nagesh. It was a very thought-provoking speech, questioning whether the pressure that children undergo in preparing for IIT entrance examinations, especially in places like Kota, is worth the damage to their psyche, since many of them commit suicide. He appealed to parents not to live out their dreams through their children and to reassure them about parental support in whatever field they want to excel in. A very nice speech, but our Detective showed no mercy. Questioning revealed that TM Nagesh as Treasurer had been castigated by the President for insufficient fee collection. The audience sighed, understanding the Treasurer's turmoil.

P-6 evaluation criteria was delivered by TM Kumar, who took everybody through the learning steps in the six project speeches and explained what was being attempted today, viz Vocal variety. Our Detective pounced on him, of course, and his probing immediately revealed the sense of competitiveness that GK felt against Aji, who was flying high on a club promoted by GK. The audience looked very thoughtful at this and wondered how deep the envy was. And why did GK refuse a DNA test?

P-6 speech "Sounds of Silence" was delivered by TM Rajat. He revealed a dialogue-writing concept  called Subtext and ran through a few examples of outer and inner dialogue in literature and films. The ending emphasized that it is equally important to understand our loved ones' inner dialogue in real life and not just in the creative arts. Our Detective prompted him for his inner dialogues about the President and came to know that the President had stolen TM Rajat's thunder a few times. The audience rolled their eyes and wondered how the President had been alive so long.

Table topics were conducted by MTM Panna. In keeping with the theme of the day, most of the topics were mysterious story-beginnings that the speakers had to complete. Some speakers revelled in it, some decided to stick to real life, but all in all the comfort levels of all speakers was very high. Our Detective cornered the Topicmaster, of course, and forced from her that she was under a lot of pressure from the President for arranging the agendas perfectly and well in advance. But was that a reason to indulge in murder? The audience shook their head, doubting whether this motive held water.

Speech evaluations were crisply delivered by both the evaluators, with great width and depth. Our Detective found nothing further to extract from them and left them alone this time.

It was time for the President to return on stage, but his ethereal version would simply not do. So the beautiful Tantrics were summoned again (MTMs Kavita and Swati this time), who restored body to soul with their magic chant, probably uttered in reverse this time. President promptly demanded to know the identity of his murderer and the Detective, after much humming and hawing, declared that the culprit was none other than our Ex-Director, TM Kumar ! After that, in an unprecedented show of forgiveness and sportsman spirit, the corpse and the murderer hugged each other, presided by a beaming Detective, sucking furiously away at his unlit pipe.

The President introduced our keynote speaker for the evening, Dr Rajesh Nayak, who must have been both amused and bemused at the murderous proceedings, wondering how to match this theme to the theme of his speech. Notwithstanding, Dr Nayak delivered an excellent address, with humour and insight, ending with an encouragement to quickly complete our 100, like Don Bradman, whose fifty mostly meant a hundred. We look forward to seeing you there sir.

A cake was rolled out and cut by the President and....the First Lady, whose birthday it happened to be. This must have been a party of a kind for her, with so many Toastmasters toasting her good health.

General Evaluation was carried out by TM Mathen. Given the attendance, energy and quality of the session, he was almost the hypothetical person - a satisfied mother-in-law. We hope that even in future sessions, such abundance of participation is repeated.

The awards presented were as follows:

• Best Topic Speaker:  TM Varun
• Best Evaluator:          TM Kumar
• Best Speaker:             TM Rajat

President Aji Baskar presented a memento to Dr Rajesh Nayak. Mementos were also presented to the Golden Boys - TM Kaushik, Vignesh and Rajkamal, who had been integral to the running of this club from the inception. Sponsors of the club DTM Rajendra Varma and TM Kumar, as well as mentor TM Saiju Victor were felicitated and thanked for their unflinching support.

The session ended with cake, snacks and tea and lots of back-slapping. The hypothetical tensions created by TMOD for his theme dissolved in laughter and good cheer.

See you all again on 22.10.16, in the great race to our 100th session.

PS - More photos can be seen in the Facebook page

50th session

We were standing poised at the crease, watching the bowler start his run-up, squinting at his grip to make out the swing. The score-board showed 49 and it needed just a little flick with a quick short run to complete the half-century. But did we do that? NO! In true Dhoni style, we lifted the ball over mid-on for a massive six. Our 2nd Debate session was scheduled today. With body mikes.

This was our 50th session, although our celebrations have been reserved for the next session, as people were already saturated with celebrations during the navaratri week. So TM Kumar opened the session in a matter-of-fact note, though with enthusiasm, saving the best for next week's SAA.

President Aji Baskar's story this time was set in our desert lands, with two friends who fought and helped each other and finally learnt that anger should be written on sand and gratitude in stone, for do we not know which is worth preserving? Nice one, Prez.

TMOD Rita had chosen as her theme Ripley's Believe It or Not, something that most of us in our 40's and 50's have grown up with, so it was quite nostalgic. She gave us an insight into Ripley's life and works and also introduced every roleplayer with something unbelievable that happened in his life. Good theme, MTM Rita.

Timekeeper TM Dilip was introduced and he explained the timing rules to us, efficiently but sketchily.

This was follwed by the much-awaited Debate session, moderated by TM Rajat. The topic was "Electric energy should replace fuel energy in transportation". The FOR team was represented by TM Chaitanya, TM Ram and MTM Panna. The AGAINST team was represented by TM Aji, TM Saleem and TM Venkat (substitute player as TM Ananth fell ill). It was quite a fiery session as the subject was semi-technical and full of data. Discussions covered technology, costs, performance, environmental impact and simple practicability. The debators argued and orated and almost shook fists at each other... all in good spirit of course. The audience declared the Against team the winner for the evening and MTM Panna, TM Aji and TM Chaitanya the best speakers.

Wordmaster MTM Shobha introduced the word CONDUCIVE to the group. It was not a very difficult word and the round robin whizzed around successfully.

Jokemaster MTM Kaviya for once turned the tables. All the jokes had men as subjects and were at their expense. A nice reply to the chauvinists who keep flaunting their one-sided jokes, MTM Kaviya.

Table topics were conducted by TM Venkat and in his inimitable style, he produced topics that were more bizzare than the last. Head stuck in a glass bowl, sky turning green, dentures made of chocolate and what not. But we will forever remember MTM Swati's glee in having to speak about chocolates - as long as they are in her mouth, one way or another.

Grammarian TM Nagesh counted a few Ahs, admired a nice turn of phrase and retired. Obviously this role is energy-sapping and it is better to be conservative than liberal in this house. Smart move, TM.

Harkmaster MTM Swati conducted a detailed quiz, including technical bits picked out of the debate, which really made the audience scrape the bottom of the barrel in order to answer. But the RTC audience has plenty of bounce and finally satisfied her queries and changed her question marks to a full stop.

There had been no project speech as the scheduled speaker had shared at the last moment that his P3 speech was not fully ready. He had been told by VP-E to defer his speech. TM Kumar took this opportunity to make the point that (a) people should not give a speech unless they were fully ready and (b) they should, at the same time, try to fulfill their speech commitments and if not possible, inform 2-3 days in advance so that alternate arrangements can be made. Point noted GK.

Generak Evaluator TM Raja strolled through all the role-players, by and large showering praise.

The day's winners were:

• Best Table topic :       TM Nagesh

(photos will be added later - some problem with photo upload)

See you all on 15.10.16.

This will be the half-century celebrations, so definitely do come, and bring friends.

49th session

49th session had everything going for it. Attendance was good. The role-players had confirmed early. Two speeches were scheduled. Both Aji and Kumar were in town together. It was too good to be true. Well, MTM Panna had to drop out at the last minute due to an emergency and the role rolled over to the ever ready GK.

The session kicked off on the dot. SAA was very energetic today and the audience sat up and took notice at everything he said, as if hearing them for the first time.

President Aji Baskar had chosen Elon Musk as his model today and he extolled him as the "real life Iron Man", a miracle worker, with path-breaking projects like Paypal, Tesla Motors and Space-X under his belt. Space-X is in fact aimed at colonising Mars and the first step is an unmanned cargo flight going there every two years, like a bus. Elon's motto is hard work without worrying about the result. Aji ended by saying he was like a "real life James Bond". Well, it would be nice if we came to a decision about this, Aji.

TMOD Rajat Ray had chosen as his theme AUTOMOBILES. It is a vast subject of course, merely to be touched upon as an introduction. He introduced every role player talking about his or her favourite car and why. What gave it a twist was his assertion that there is a similarity between why a person chooses a car and why he chooses his or her life partner. The desires of the role players caused much amusement when viewed in the context of a life partner. The use of Powerpoint to aid in a TMOD speech was also a novelty.

Timekeeper of the day, TM Chaitanya, was totally on the ball, as usual. His feedback on times taken by role-players was impeccable and his continuous feedback to TMOD as to how late the session was running was also very helpful.

Wordmaster MTM Swati presented the word VALIANT for the day. A relatively friendly word, everyone could easily make sentences on it in round robin.

Jokemaster TM Karthik's jokes were, as he said, very clean and politically correct (TM Venkat later claimed joint authorship!). He ended with a nice story from Mr Abdul Kalam, as to how trees collect life around them and it is indeed worthwhile investing in them.

P-2 evaluation criteria were described by TM Kumar. He highlighted the expectation that a speech at this level was supposed to be structured (opening, body, and conclusion), interesting (attention-grabbing opening) and consistent (title, opening and closing should tie up). 

P-2 speech was delivered by TM Raja titled "Poised to Move". Based on his distrust of stock market speculation and a couple of real life experiences, he could drive home the argument quite forcibly. We all are wary of speculation nowadays, aren't we Raja?

P-3 evaluation criteria were described by TM Ramalingam. Apart from the basic requirement of having a general purpose and a specific purpose, he also asked the speaker to keep an eye on eye-contact, stage movement, delivery etc.

P-3 speech was delivered by MTM Rita titled "Are you Superstitious?". Yes, many of us are, madam. She made the point forcibly that there is actually no correlation between the voodoo we believe in and real life, and it is indeed a waste of time and intelligence. Thank you MTM, and we will discuss it with the black cat when it crosses my path next time!

Table topics were conducted by MTM Kavita and she adhered to the theme of Automobiles. Her topics were regarding cars or journeys. All the speakers were comfortable with the topics and TM Ramalingam in particular enjoyed his own speech about bike riding as much as the audience did. A good job, MTM, and your idea of pulling out topics from inside toy cars was innovative, though a little time-consuming!

TM Kumar gave his feedback on the P-2 speech. While appreciating the speaker's choice of subject, his structuring of the speech and easy style, he recommended that he spoke louder next time and reduce stage movement. Content, good. Delivery, to improve.

TM Ramalingam gave his feedback on the P-3 speech. He appreciated the choice of topic and said asserted that requirements of general purpose and specific purpose were met. He appreciated the speaker's delivery and stage movements. The only point of improvement mentioned was preparation.

Grammarian TM Ananth was on stage next. He gave a small homily on the requirements of grammar and a grammarian in life as well as in Toastmasters. We understood the importance of eliminating meaningless connecting conjunctions from our speeches and got worried at his suggestion that we be fined 100 Baiza for every Ah used. He finally pointed out a only few mistakes made by the role players and ended up a very popular Grammarian.

Harkmaster was played by our new member MTM Kaviya, who split the hall into two quiz teams and had a gala time. We also enjoyed it MTM. Which side won, by the way?

An Education session was conducted by TM Rajat on the CL manual - the vision behind it and how to maintain it. Many members had not filled it till now. They were advised to go to the blogsite (preferably on a PC/laptop, not phone), click on Role History and note down on which days they had played which role, and update the last page of the CL manual accordingly.

General Evaluator TM Venkat ran through his evaluation of every role. He appreciated the hurry of the Timekeeper (as we were already behind schedule), the innovation of the TMOD, the positive word of the Wordmaster, the clean humour of the Jokemaster, the clarity of the evaluators, the relevence of the speakers, and the little gimmick of the Tablemaster. Very few negatives there, GE, so it was a good session, right?

However, the session ended at 5.10 instead of at 4.54. This is something we have got to crack - analyse where we get late. Is the planning too tight, or some roles invariably over-run, or what?

President took the stage back from TMOD and closed it with a clap.

He reminded people that although the next session was our 50th, we were celebrating it on our 51st session on 15.10.16, which MUST NOT BE MISSED!

The day's winners were:

• Best Table speaker:       TM Ramalingam
• Best Evaluator:              TM Kumar
• Best Speaker:                 TM Raja and MTM Rita (joint)

See you all on 8.10.16. 

Please do fill up your CL manuals in the meanwhile (call me in case of difficulty)